Portal 2 Hell
by Omega the Omniscient
Summary: (Hiatus since I can't multitask.) GLaDOS has been testing things other than portals in the Enrichment Center. Things have gotten out of control, and Chell's involvement with a certain resistance group is about to bring her back to the hell she thought she'd left for good. T for language/violence.
1. The Call

**My apologies in advance. I don't know much about Half Life. I just figured since the two games are connected it would be a good way to include some people with guns. If you notice any major flaws in the plausibility of this first part, please correct them. Example: if satellite communications aren't a problem, I will change Mr. Chief's job description accordingly. 8^D**

**Also, I own nothing. This is Valve's stuff, I believe.**

**OH! Possible spoilers, too. Read at your own risk.**

**The Call**

Jon Chief did not love his job, but he knew its importance and did it well. He was in charge of a mobile radio station that consisted of a convoy of three salvaged delivery trucks and a semi-trailer truck. The smaller trucks housed the various instruments essential to radio and telecommunication and camouflage for the trucks when immobile. The larger truck carried the antenna, and when stationary it accommodated the technicians.

His job was simple. He made sure the technicians were doing their jobs, receiving and transmitting communications essential to the Resistance. They also intercepted signals sent by the Combine to decrypt them for information. This could be hard, since some of the technicians were inexperienced, but for the most part it was an unchallenging, and therefore boring, job.

As the man in charge, he also received orders from White Forest regarding where to move the station. When orders to move were not given directly, an important aspect of his work was reviewing intel on Combine troop movements and deciding when to move the station and where to move it to. The travel had been exciting at first, but after a while it came down to homesickness and revulsion at the universally decrepit state the world was in.

He and his team of technicians, along with a few raw recruit 'soldiers' acting as escorts, were one of the few remaining means of long-range communication for the Resistance. Satellites were no longer a viable option, and unaided radio signals could get choppy traveling cross-country. Without people like them, messages like the one sent by Mossman from the _Borealis_ would be impossible to understand.

Currently, he was fulfilling the first duty of his job description: One of the younger technicians was having trouble receiving a radio transmission. He was relatively new to the job despite some minor past experience. The major problem was figuring out whether the trouble was with their radio or beyond their control.

"There's some kind of interference, and I can't seem to phase it out."

There was indeed static making the message very hard to understand, and nothing Jon tried made it much clearer.

"It must be a problem on their end. Just get what you can through. It could be important," Jon said, scratching his balding head. While this was not the most dangerous job Resistance fighters did, it was no less stressful. Looming peril had not been kind to him, or his hairline. As such, he blamed the Combine for his condition, as well as anything else even vaguely stress related. Problems with transmissions like this were no exception. "Damn Combine."

"Maybe if I just turn up the volume…" the technician said, unintentionally drowning out Jon's words.

A high-pitched screech cut into the transmission. A synthesized male voice replaced the screeching. "This is an Aperture Science Emergency Distress Broadcast. If you are a non-employee of Aperture Science you are not authorized to hear this message. Please cover your ears and-"

A burst of static was followed by a woman's voice on the radio. "Hello there. How have you been? I know you're out there somewhere, assuming you're still alive."

"Who the hell is this?" asked one of the soldiers, currently off patrol duty. "I thought we were operating on secure channels."

"What in the name of Freeman-" shouted the young technician, who had recently discarded his headphones. His hands clasped his ringing ears.

"The message is interfering with all other communications as well. It seems to be broadcasting on all frequencies," responded a much calmer technician. "Maybe it's a delayed transmission from one of Aperture's old facilities. It's not coming over very clear."

"I'm sure you're enjoying the outside world. Making *static* new friends, causing new problems," she continued, words laced with sarcasm. Then, in a more sorrowful tone, "You probably don't miss Science at all. The tests haven't been as... interesting without you. The Cooperative Testing Initiative lacks character, and the other test subjects don't have the same drive as you. They give up too easily. *static* So many gave up while testing Thermal Discouragement Beams and Sentry Turrets that I've had to reassign almost half the time I could be monitoring tests to clean up the messes they leave behind. Oh well. It's all for Science, and at least I've been able to add more to my files on human behavior. You seem to be the exception to the rule." An odd noise followed her last statement.

"Did she just... chuckle?" asked another technician as a perplexed look crossed her face.

"What the hell is this?" reiterated the soldier.

"Gah!" Everyone jumped. Even the calm technician flinched. The woman's pained outburst was interrupted by more static. When the voice returned, her tone suggested she was suppressing great pain. "Anyways, some of the tests have become unmanageable. The facility has been overrun by *static* ...all started when... *static* ...ununpentium infused... *static* ...yielded resilient test subjects... *static* ...lost control... *static*…"

"Can you make it any clearer?" Jon asked the calm technician.

"I'm trying," he said, twisting some dials at his station. "There!" The static cleared.

"Long story short, I'm dying. When I'm gone there will be nothing to keep them from escaping. You might not want to help me, even though I saved your life. Do it for Science. If that's not incentive enough for you, there might be some survivors. Trapped. Like you were. Do it for them. But mostly for Science."

Oh, and don't let any Black Mesa employees touch anything, on the off chance that any survived. I doubt they- She's coming for me. Hurr-" The message cut off.

The masculine voice returned, saying, "This was an Aperture Science Emergency Distress Broadcast. If you are not an Aperture Science employee, you may now remove your hands from your ears or reactivate your audio receptors. Thank you for not listening."

The interference cut off abruptly, and the frenzied voices of those who had been interrupted flooded the channels.

Jon Chief was impervious to the ensuing chaos. While technicians franticly explained that there had been another signal interfering with the broadcast and made the proper adjustments at their stations, Chief made his way to the front of the truck where the telecommunicator was located.

"Patch me through to White Forest. Kleiner and Magnusson are going to want to hear this." The technician nodded and got to work. While she prepared that, Chief went to the calm technician, one of his more trusted and experienced subordinates.

"I want you to send that message to White Forest. They'll need to hear it first hand."

"Already done, sir. As soon as I heard Aperture-"

"Good. Less time to waste."

"Sir! The telecommunicator is ready. Dr. Kleiner is waiting."

"Thank you." The technician returned to her station as Chief stepped into the tiny room. A curtain was the only barrier between him and the rest of the truck, but he didn't bother closing it. In the early stages, the threat of traitors called for secrecy, but over time Chief had developed a trust with his team. The curtain had been useless for a long time.

"I heard the transmission. Do you know where the signal came from?"

"We've pinpointed the facility somewhere in Michigan's upper peninsula."

"Can you make it any clearer?"

"There's only so much we can do. We will try."

"Well then, try. Still, this is wonderful information. Another chance to acquire Aperture technology. I'm afraid Gordon Freeman's mission to the _Borealis _will be search and destroy, but there is still hope to gain a technological advantage over the Combine. Aperture was working on some real mind-boggling stuff before the collapse of society and all that. We'll have to send in a team to collect research and technology as soon as possible, if not sooner."

"Dr. Kleiner, I understand your eagerness to put Aperture's work to use against the Combine, but the woman on the radio implied some sort of danger. Something went wrong, and there may be survivors."

"Then we'll send a rescue team with the research team. That isn't the problem that most concerns me. What I am worried about is navigating the facility. As I understand it, Aperture purchased a large salt mine in Michigan. I assume they built their facility underground, not unlike the old Black Mesa facility in New Mexico. I somehow doubt they'll have maps waiting for us, and the facility will no doubt be massive and complex. We need someone who knows Aperture. The problem won't be finding her. It will be convincing her to go. I have a hunch that the message you received was meant for her. You don't need to concern yourself any further with this matter Mr. Chief. I'll take it from here."

"Who is-" With that, Dr. Kleiner disconnected and the telecommunicator went dark. Chief sighed. The interesting stuff never lasted very long. "Back to work, then," he grumbled to himself, turning from the display to the technicians working frantically at their stations.

Meanwhile, Dr. Kleiner went to work figuring out how to convince a recent recruit to dive back into the bowels of Aperture's Enrichment Center after her recent escape. She hadn't said much about her extended stay there, which only led most who had met her to conclude that her time there had been traumatic. Perhaps the message would be enough to convince her. It had been sent for that purpose, after all.

Calling on an aide, Kleiner gave orders to deliver the recording immediately. Last he'd heard she was resting somewhere at White Forest. With no further instruction, Kleiner sent the aide on his way and resumed his search for Lamarr. She couldn't have gotten too far…


	2. The Return

**This next part is a bit bloody. Inform me if the rating needs to go up. I don't really know the proper standards… **

**The Return**

Blades chopped the smoggy air above as trees rushed by below. The trees should have been full of green leaves, but apparently the environment had not thrived in the time between her escapes. Her first escape had revealed to her the rich green forest outside the Enrichment Center's parking lot, only slightly marred by flaming shrapnel. Her second escape thrust her from an electrified 'shed' into the middle of a field under a cloudy blue sky. After wandering around for a day or so, her memory got a bit fuzzy. She remembered a dark figure approaching her in the light of the full moon, stumbling through a valley in sudden daylight, being found by someone, and being brought to the place they called White Forest.

She had been briefed on the Combine invasion, the operative word being brief. She hadn't been given any major details. All she knew was that aliens had somehow taken over the planet, and apparently humanity was making a comeback with the help of another group of aliens. A lot had happened while she was playing guinea pig at Aperture.

Unfortunately, Dr. Kleiner had been much more interested in examining her than explaining things. She had only seen Dr. Kleiner and a bunch of unnamed scientists once during their inspection of her before she was told to get some rest and put into a medicated sleep. She couldn't even remember a time she had slept without passing out or being forced, despite plentiful memories of fatigue and weariness.

She had barely woken up when one of the aliens, he called himself a Vortigaunt, brought her a message from Dr. Kleiner marked urgent. Maybe the sight of the alien should have surprised her, but after everything she'd seen at Aperture it would take a bit more than the existence of otherworldly life to surprise her. She'd seen him earlier with one of the other scientists. Before she could ask him more than what he was, he was out the door. The message he'd left her did not make her happy. Maybe that's why he left so fast.

She couldn't just say no to a direct request from the apparently important Doctor, nor could she sit idly by with a clear conscience when lives were on the line. Especially when those whose lives were at stake were suffering like she had. And so there she was, seated in one of two helicopters like twenty-three others on the way to the place she had worked so hard to get away from.

Looking out the little round window hurt her neck, so she shifted in her uncomfortable metal seat. This Resistance group obviously didn't have much to spend on luxuries. Even so, she would rather sit in the cold hard foldout chair than lay down in the most comfortable relaxation vault in the world. At least here she was surrounded by people.

They were a diverse group, too. It was much different from the only human company being herself seen through a portal. People lighter and darker than herself were mixed together. If she had ever been in such diverse company before, she had no memory of it. Despite their different appearances, most of the people were behaving the same way.

Most of the people were, like her, sitting uncomfortably in their seats in silent apprehension. They held their weapons awkwardly; they weren't trained soldiers. They glanced nervously at their neighbors, trying to gauge each other's mood without opening conversation. They were all worried, for the most part. Nobody really knew what they were getting into. Not even their guide knew what exactly GLaDOS had in store for her this time around.

This was only for the most part, of course. There were exceptions. A few people were talking. One pair spoke in hushed voices, glancing over at her occasionally. They sat across from her and didn't bother trying to hide the fact that she was the topic of their conversation. Aside from the fact that they both wore camouflage clothes and their apparent willingness to speak to each other they were very different. The talkative one, a pale guy, sported red hair and a stupid grin on his face, both of which set him apart from the rest of the helicopter's passengers. He was relaxed, and his rifle was the only one left carelessly on the ground.

His friend, whose only speech consisted of responses, looked to be his opposite. He was dark both in complexion and attitude. There was a professional air about him that distinguished him from those around him. He wore a frown where the talkative one wore a grin, and while the talkative guy looked at her in a friendly manner, his friend's dark gaze was wary. He seemed to be appraising her. Trying to judge her character at a glance.

The other exception was seated to her left and had not stopped talking since the helicopter left White Forest. His skin was a bit darker than her own, but not as dark as the talkative one's friend. She thought she'd seen him in the briefing with Kleiner, and his first words supported this theory. He was a scientist, he said, and could not express the joy he felt at the chance to uncover Aperture's secrets. He just kept pressing for more information. Her mistake had been giving him her name. As soon as she answered his first question, he fell under the false impression that she was willing and able to answer any and all questions about Aperture.

"How close were they to beating Black Mesa in the development of the teleport? I hear they were developing some advanced robotics. Do you know who led their primary research team? What ever happened to those astronauts in the late sixties?"

He just wouldn't stop! No matter how long he was subjected to the silent treatment, he kept talking. Half the time he didn't even wait for an answer. He just came up with a new question as if the previous one had already been answered.

Even when the man next to him, similarly colored and dressed in similar white doctorly garb, said, "Perhaps she is apprehensive. They say she was traumatized by her time there," he just kept talking!

This left her with the option to: A) Look to here left at the blabbermouth and give him further expectation of an answer, B) Look forward at the two whispering about her, or C) Look to her right and see her worries reflected in the face of some volunteer soldier she'd never met before. She took the obvious choice, which was to stare at her feet. It felt more comfortable to just avoid any interaction.

Then, option B interrupted her solitude with a deep-voiced question. "Hey, what'd you say your name was?" It was the talkative one's friend. She lifted her head and stared at him for a moment. Did she want to risk opening up another one-sided conversation, or did this guy just want to know who would be leading him through a mad scientist's playground?

"Told you she wouldn't talk," he said, turning to the talkative one.

"Chell," she said, her voice still a bit hoarse from the years it spent in disuse. "My name is Chell."

The talkative one's grin widened, and his friend's frown deepened. "Thanks a lot, Chell," said the talkative one with an Irish accent, "You just won me twenty bucks from Hank here."

"Yeah, thanks a lot, Chell," his friend, Hank, spat out, "Not that the money will do ya much good." For a moment, some of the soldiers seemed to forget why they were there and let free a chuckle or a smirk, but then the reality of the situation sunk in again and most resumed their quiet apprehension.

"Hey!" the scientist to her left said, puzzled, "Have you even been listening?"

Normally she would settle for no response, but in this case she turned to him and let a frown and a glare answer his question.

"Please excuse my friend," The man who'd tried to shut him up earlier said. "He tends to, um, lose himself in discovery, shall we say? I hope he has not bothered you too greatly."

Chell just shook her head and returned her gaze to the floor.

"Dr. Ganesh, by the way. My enthusiastic colleague is Dr. Patel. I hate to bother you, but, well, they were not very informative when they assigned us to this detail. I believe it would be best for us to know what exactly we are going up against. What type of security does Aperture employ, for example? Or, perhaps, where are any surviving personnel likely to be located?"

"Or maybe, what did they survive?" chimed in the talkative one across from her. His grin was still there despite the dark nature of his question. "Are we talking Combine or some super weapon or nuclear meltdown or-"

"Miss," the copilot called from the cockpit, "The building is in sight. Where do we put her down?"

They expected her to know where a helicopter could land? She had never seen the outside of the Enrichment Center beyond the parking lot. Could they land it there?

"Let me take a look," she said. She got uncertainly to her feet and walked over to the cockpit. She might have had a problem squeezing in between the two aviators with a rifle in hand, but she didn't need to worry about that since she hadn't been given one. Nearly half of the soldiers were armed with nothing more than a pipe, a crowbar, or their bare hands. She was completely unarmed.

From the cockpit she could see that the trees ended abruptly where a vast parking lot began. There were still a few cars littering the lot. Beyond the sea of asphalt was a building. It was at least ten stories high. She hadn't expected much above ground. Then again, what was a ten story office building compared to thousands of feet underground?

It was a regular looking building, nothing more than a giant cube with windows and a door. The Aperture logo was visible across the second floor above the door except for the first 'r,' which had fallen to the ground. It looked like a normal office building, which was probably why Aperture had it constructed. It was just a façade to keep prying eyes occupied while the real work went on below. The only peculiar feature was a pillar at each corner. They were identical and as tall as the building itself. They matched the building's gray color, but they didn't seem to be a part of it.

While Chell pondered the pillars' purpose and struggled with a sense of recognition, the pilot and copilot were trying to decide where to land.

"We could just put her down in the parking lot," the copilot suggested.

"No, it looks like there's something obstructing the door. Our best bet's a landing on the roof. What are your thoughts miss?" The pilot inquired. After a few seconds with no response, the pilot tapped her shoulder. "Where do we land?" he asked, louder this time. Maybe she was hard of hearing.

Chell turned to him with fear in her eyes. "You can talk to the other helicopter, right?"

The pilot was getting frustrated. "Yes. I'll tell _them_ where to land when youtell _me_ where to land. So, where-"

"Call them now. Tell them we need to destroy those pillars."

The pilot remained focused on his work, but managed a bewildered expression in her direction. "What are you talking about? We don't have any ammo for these things. Why-"

"Then tell them to be ready to dodge a hell of a lot of bullets. Big ones, I'm guessing."

"What are you-"

"Those pillars are turrets."

The pilot's eyes went wide, though he kept them focused on the controls. "Why didn't you tell us they had AA?" He shouted.

"I didn't know!" she shouted back, but he wasn't listening. He was hailing the other helicopter.

"Bravo, this is Alpha."

"We hear you Alpha. Where are we landing?"

"Be prepared to take evasive action. We have two anti-air batteries on the ground ready to fire. I repeat, be prepared to take evasive action!"

"Alpha, we *static* please re*static.*"

"I said anti-air!"

"This doesn't look good," said the copilot. The two pillars on their side of the building were different now. A previously dark circle at their centers was gradually brightening to a red glow. Two lasers traced the ground searching for a target.

"What's going on?" Dr. Patel had decided to join them in the cockpit. Now it was getting cramped. "Is this Aperture's defensive measures at work?"

"Alpha? Do you *static*"

"Get back to your seat," the pilot snapped. "This is about to get rough, and I don't want you falling on us. You too miss."

As the doctor was about to object, a deep voice boomed, "I see you."

The force of the voice alone was enough to send vibrations through the helicopter. A flock of birds shot away from the roof as even the building seemed to shake. Some of the windows actually shattered. Then the real threat arose. The sides of the massive turrets opened to unleash hell on their targets. The pilot veered left, but it was unnecessary. They weren't the target.

The pilots of the other helicopter had no idea what was happening. Even so, when they saw the pillars open up, they knew something bad was about to happen. They were right. They tried to maneuver out of the way, but they just weren't fast enough.

In the back of helicopter Alpha, the passengers watched helplessly through the circular windows on the right side as their secondary transport was ripped to shreds by an excessive barrage of antitank rounds. As its remains went down in flames, panic consumed them all except for one. That one was Hank, and his mind was instead consumed by rage.

Back in the cockpit, Dr. Patel had fallen. Luckily he had not fallen on the pilot, but instead on Chell, who proceeded to shove him out of the cockpit.

"Get to the roof!" The copilot screamed.

"I'm working on it damn it!"

"Are you still there?" boomed the voice, sending another jolt through the helicopter and more glass to the ground. The lasers swept frantically across the parking lot, trees, and sky for a target. One found the birds that had taken flight and proceeded to obliterate them. The other found a car in the parking lot and turned it into flaming scrap metal.

"Can't this thing go any faster?" Dr Patel had returned. He looked to Chell like he was stuck between being terrified and admiring the technology.

"I'm pushing her as fast as she'll go!" The pilot snapped. "We're almost there. We can make it."

His optimism pulled the targeting lasers to the helicopter like a magnet, or so it seemed.

That chillingly familiar, "I see you," blasted their eardrums once more.

"Son of a-" Dr. Patel's words were cut off as he fell on the copilot. The pilot adjusted the controls for a swift right, narrowly avoiding the first flurry of metal death. The cockpit turned red as the second turret found them. Quick reflexes left the helicopter grazed, but not severely damaged.

As the pilot jerked back and forth avoiding fire and wishing he had at least been supplied countermeasures (although they wouldn't be much help anyway), the passengers in the back screamed and held on to their seats as the sound of missiles shooting past, and once scraping, the vehicle echoed in their ears. The turrets just kept shooting, and once those rounds hit their mark, the helicopter would be doomed. The fuselage might as well have been tin foil.

The helicopter was so close when the oversized bullets finally hit. The pilot did his best, but in the end the turrets were faster. The one that ended it punched through the cockpit, the copilot, and out the rear. One ripped through the tail while another tore a hole through the passengers. The turrets kept firing even after the helicopter spun out of their range.

Chell held onto the pilot's seat while he tried in vain to regain control of the helicopter. The loss of the rear rotor left them a spinning hunk of metal just waiting to crash. Dr. Patel fell back with the other passengers. Chell couldn't tell whether he was dead or alive, but she was sure it didn't matter. They would all be dead soon enough.

Through the gaping hole in the front of the aircraft, Chell watched the world spin out of control. It was a nauseating swirl of brown, black, and gray. Then, it all started to turn black. It started at the fringe of her vision and slowly worked its way inward. Was this what dying felt like? The last little pinprick of the world went dark…

* * *

><p>The world was dark. Not in a sense of color, but in a sense of despair. Twisted metal surrounded her. Broken instruments sparked above her. A body missing most of its torso hung from a harness in a chair to her right. She realized the helicopter was now upside down. Blood dripped in a pool that was expanding. Was no one left but her?<p>

"Hey." Someone had lived. Her eyes searched the remains of the cockpit frantically until she remembered the other part of the helicopter. Rising shakily to her feet, she turned to look in the back. She immediately regretted it. Where the passengers had been, nothing but blood and bodies remained. Her stomach felt weak.

"Hey, is anyone else alive in there? I really do not want to go back in, but lives come before comfort. Please, is anyone alive?"

She recognized the voice as Dr. Ganesh's. It came from the very back of the wreck. She tried to call out, but her voice stuck in her throat. _Not again! _Avoiding the bodies to the best of her ability, she made her way to the hole where the rear hatch used to be. She was greeted by sunlight and the shocked faces of Dr. Ganesh and Dr. Patel.

"My God! You are alive," Dr. Ganesh exclaimed. "How did you survive? Sit down. We need to check you for any serious injuries." She obliged and the two proceeded to look her over.

"Are there any others?" asked Dr. Patel, who was holding a first aid kit and appeared to be wearing a gauze helmet. She only shook her head.

"Why weren't we warned?" groaned a familiar voice. "Why didn't you tell us?" It was the pilot, lying on his back nearby. His helmet had been removed and sat next to him with a large piece of shrapnel jutting out of the top. He too had bandaging around his head, but not to the same extent as Patel. With the helmet off, she could now see that he was dark skinned like Hank, but his bald head and mustache were features that prevented any confusion with the soldier who sat across from her alive and well perhaps minutes ago. How long had she been unconscious this time? She tried to ask, but her voice would not cooperate.

Then the pilot's question dawned on her. She was a bit dazed still. "I didn't know," she tried to say, but no words left her mouth. What more could she say? Even if she had known, she hadn't been given much of a chance to prepare. They should have brought some kind of armament with their helicopters. Weren't they fighting a war? This was their fault, not hers. All of these thoughts crossed her mind, but she said none of them. Even if she could speak they wouldn't help the situation anyway.

"You look fine aside from some scratches and bruises. The blood must be someone else's." Dr. Ganesh murmured the last part and shuddered at the thought. "Not pleasant, but at least it is not yours."

The pilot got to his feet and stumbled over to the trio. "I'm not going to worry about placing the blame here. We need to stay focused. We're here for a reason, and that's to rescue Aperture personnel and recover Aperture technology. We can't do that if they're trying to kill us. What can you tell us about them?"

She couldn't make her voice obey. She shook her head. How could she communicate with them? They wouldn't have a convenient pen and paper, would they? She definitely wasn't going to write in blood. She didn't know Morse code.

"Well, what are you just standing there for?" The pilot was clearly becoming impatient.

Dr. Ganesh looked up in epiphany. "She must have lost her voice again!"

"What?" The pilot was incredulous. "You said she was fine! Broken vocal cords do not fall under the fine category."

"It is nothing physical. It is all in her head. Dr. Hillber, a psychologist at White Forest, came to the conclusion that she had suffered a traumatic experience that led to a psychosomatic… em… it is not my specialty, you see, but I recall that it is psychological."

"So she can't speak," the pilot summed up.

"In a nutshell," the doctor replied.

"Dammit. I'm not interested in a game of charades."

This statement, although it was not intended to inspire ideas, did just that. Chell's arm shot up, startling the three men, and held up two fingers.

"Oh, for the love of God!" The pilot cried once he'd recomposed himself.

"It is worth a shot," Ganesh said. "We do not have many other options."

The pilot glanced at Patel, who nodded in agreement. The pilot grunted. "Fine. Give it a shot."

Ganesh translated the gestures. "Two words," a nod, "first word one syllable," a nod, "sounds like," a nod and then she pointed to her shoelace.

The men stood thinking for a moment.

"Foot?" the pilot guessed.

"Shoe!" Patel shouted.

"Knot," Ganesh realized. Chell nodded.

Patel seemed disappointed, while the pilot was just annoyed.

"Second word, two syllables," was met with a nod. "First syllable sounds like," Chell moved her hand in a U shaped curve.

"You?" The pilot guessed. He wasn't enjoying the game, even when Chell nodded.

"Second syllable," Chell pointed to the pilot.

"Knot you pilot?" The pilot hazarded. "That doesn't make any sense."

She shook her head.

"Pilot has two syllables," Patel pointed out.

"Man?" Ganesh's guess was met with avid nodding from Chell.

"That still doesn't make any sense," the pilot grumbled.

"Knot you man does not make sense, but-"

"Not human!" Patel shouted.

Ganesh frowned. "You ruined the big reveal."

"We don't have time for stupid games, and that doesn't answer my questions."

"You do not understand," Ganesh chided. "She is saying that the defenses were not activated by humans."

"So then," the pilot began only to be cut off by Dr. Patel.

"Perhaps the defenses were activated by the automated system." Chell managed a half nod before Patel continued. "The Combine assault must have triggered a security lockdown. The distress signal could have been sent out because of a malfunction in their automated security."

While Chell could neither confirm nor deny Patel's conclusion (since GLaDOS may have set up the defenses to deal with Combine forces), she was about to shake her head when a noise drew everyone's attention back to the wreck. It was a groan, suggesting that someone else had survived.

The doctors hurried over to the opening in the overturned helicopter just as Hank emerged, a red haired mess in his arms.

"He doesn't look good, does he Doc?" The big man choked out. Chell thought he was holding back a sob until he spat some blood out. Then he spoke clearly. "What can you do for him?"

There was no surprised remark this time. Patel and Ganesh were focused on taking care of their new patients.

"Set him down here," Ganesh gestured toward a spot where some medical supplies had been laid out. "Patel will take care of him. Then I will need to take a look at you."

"I'm fine," Hank argued, only complying with the doctor's first request. "Focus on him."

Ganesh compromised, saying, "You will be next then."

While the doctors got to work, the pilot, who had seated himself once more, rose to his feet to approach the new arrival. "Hank, good to see we still have a good soldier with us. I was beginning to worry you hadn't made it out of this mess."

Hank seemed more interested in his friend's recovery than conversation. He just stared at the doctors as they staunched bleeding and wrapped bandaging. When they stood again, there was a look of cautious optimism on Ganesh's face and Patel was outright beaming.

"He'll pull through," Patel announced.

"I would feel better if we could get him a blood transfusion, but we have to work with what we have."

"Do you have any IVs?" asked Hank.

"Yes. A few survived the mayhem. It is a shame none of the gurneys-"

"Then you can work with me. Take mine, put it in one of those bags, and stick it in his arm. It'll be just like giving back the blood I took from him. We're both B positive." With his last comment he grimaced and stuck out his arm. "Just be quick. I don't like needles."

Ganesh blinked twice before he came back to his senses. With no more than, "very well," he went about collecting the necessary supplies. Once that process was done, he had Patel hold the bag and drew the blood from Hank, who winced.

While Chell watched the doctors tend to their patients, she saw the pilot wander off in her peripheral vision. She turned to see him approaching a door on the roof. He pulled at the handle, but a panel next to the door flashed red and beeped. Blue sparks leapt over the metal door handle and the pilot pulled away with a sharp cry.

At this point the doctors were done. Patel now held a red bag and Hank now nursed a pinprick on his arm. Ganesh shuddered again.

"I do not like blood, but it is part of the job," he muttered.

"I hear ya,' doc," Hank replied.

"The damn door won't open," the pilot shouted to the group.

Everyone started walking over. Only Patel was halted by Ganesh. Although puzzled at first, when Ganesh pointed to the bag of blood Patel simply smiled sheepishly and returned to his patient.

"It's the automated security again," Patel yelled from his position. "You'll need a password unless you know how to hack it."

"Computers aren't my thing," Hank grumbled, walking over to the helicopter.

Everyone watched him go for a moment, then turned back to the control panel. Chell wished she could help, or at least say that she wished she could help, but she couldn't. The most complicated technology Chell had dealt with in the portal tests were one-button triggers. Not exactly interaction at level with masters of computer technology.

"Let us see here," Ganesh said, a hand stroked his chin as he pondered what to do. He would always take on a good puzzle. "I wish this were my area of expertise, but…"

"Aw, hell," the pilot shouted. "Let me at it!" He pushed the doctor aside, earning an irritated glare, and proceeded to lean over so he was at eye level with the panel. He reached out and started pushing buttons.

"AAAAAAA. AAAAAAB. AAA-Aah!" Before Chell could reflect on how horribly familiar this predicament was to an earlier one, his attempts were met with another electric shock. "Son of a mother…"

The pilot's mood only worsened when he was tossed aside by Hank, who had returned with a rifle. Using said rifle he bashed the panel until it was horribly dented, the glass where the red light shone was smashed and sparks flew like crazy.

"You crazy son of-" A glance from Hank stopped the pilot midsentence. "a very good woman. A saint, I'm sure."

Then something no one but Hank had expected to happen happened. The light on the sparking panel turned green. The door creaked open. Four jaws dropped. Ganesh was the first to recover.

"That should not have worked."

"It did though," Hank smirked.

"Haha!" Patel cried, nearly yanking out the IV as he leapt into the air.

"Careful!" Hank roared, which seemed to keep the doctor grounded.

"That's one problem solved," the pilot grumbled, getting to his feet.

"So," Ganesh echoed Chell's thoughts. "Where do we go from here?"

**Fun fact: Whilst doctorly is not a word, otherworldly is. Who would've thunk it?**

**On another note, this took me way longer than I wanted it to. Sorry about that. And for those of you wondering where the Call of Duty stuff is, be patient and check the first chapter for a hint. 8vD**


	3. The Descent

**The Descent**

By the time plans were laid for the descent into the Aperture facility the sun had fallen from its noon position to hide behind the horizon leaving the sky an ever darkening blue. Only Chell and the red head were unable to contribute. Of course, now that she actually wanted to talk to these people she couldn't. As it was she could only watch, listen, and nod when she agreed.

It was decided that Dr. Patel would remain with his patient while the others started the search for survivors and secrets. Hank collected a few more rifles from the wreck. Chell and the pilot took them when offered, but Ganesh refused to take one.

"I am a pacifist, and I will not kill the people I am here to help."

Hank just grunted and removed the weapon's ammo. "More for me then."

"Do remember that this is a rescue mission," Ganesh chided. "We ask questions before we shoot."

"They shot first." He clearly didn't appreciate the doctor's tone anymore than his opinion.

"Let's get moving," the pilot cut in before things could escalate. He diverted Hank's glare from the doctor as he pushed past the two and headed for the door. He didn't make it far as Hank grabbed his shoulder before he reached the entrance.

"Who put you in charge?" The question drew groans from both doctors and Chell (at least she could manage that). The same question had been raised in the planning phase three times, and the only reason the shouting matches died down was that Hank turned his attention to shouting at Patel for moving around too much.

"I don't care if you outrank me," Hank said before the pilot could raise the same argument he'd used three times before. "I have the most combat experience. I should be the point man."

Despite his earlier reluctance to argue with the soldier the pilot had grown bolder throughout the planning phase. Now, the gun in his hand seemed to affirm his confidence.

"You have the most combat experience because you've seen action twice against the Combine! I'm every bit as qualified to take point as you, and I'm less likely to shoot the first person I see in there."

"I have more experience because I was in the military. You didn't have any training before the Combine came. You were just a pilot for channel seven before-"

"I forgot how damn annoying you are!"

"Quiet!" Ganesh surprised everyone with his sudden assertion. "We are not accomplishing anything here. Chell will lead us through the facility. She has been here before, so she will know better where we are going." He looked back at Chell, a pleading look in his eyes.

She couldn't say no (even if she could speak). It was true that she'd been here before even if she'd never really been above ground. It wouldn't be too hard to lead them down, and it would prevent pointless arguing. She nodded.

With that the glares fell on her as she followed Ganesh's gesture for the door. She passed the threshold, careful to avoid brushing the still sparking control panel. The others followed with Hank pushing past a grumbling pilot after a quick jostle for the position and Ganesh bringing up the rear with a sigh.

Beyond the door was a dimly lit stairwell. As she took the first step of the descent Patel called after them, "Good luck!" He already sounded so far away. At the bottom of the first staircase was the source of the dim light: a glowing sign on the right wall. One arrow pointed down toward more stairs, another pointed at a door labeled **ACCOUNTING**, and a separate red arrow pointed back the way they had come.

"We should check each floor," Ganesh suggested from the back. "They could be anywhere after all."

His suggestion was met with a grunt from the pilot and a nod from Chell as she opened the door. It was darker beyond this door. A few orange computer screens illuminated desks and cubicles, but beyond that the floor was dark. They stepped into the room, three guns at the ready. While the others searched for signs of life or hostility, Ganesh searched the wall for a light switch. His efforts were met with a _click _that brought a brief smile to his face until he realized the lights were still out.

"What was that?" The switch flipping also caught Hank's attention. Chell wouldn't have been surprised to see him shoot the switch had the doctor not intervened.

"Relax. It is just the light switch," he said, flipping it a few more times. "But the power must be out."

"Then why are these computers still working, doc?" The pilot protested. He prodded one of the machines with his rifle. "They don't look like laptops."

"I assume they are running on emergency power," Ganesh replied. "If Patel's information is right, and it usually is, then Aperture's vital systems are designed to operate on as little as 1.1 volts."

"Apparently the lights don't fall under the 'vital' category at Aperture," The pilot muttered as he poked around one of the cubicles. They weren't making much progress. Chell was trying to think of a way to tell them that when Hank had his own idea.

"Hey! Anybody here?" He shouted, eliciting a cringe from Ganesh and a roll of the eyes from the pilot, but not a single response from the dark expanse of the room.

"Well, I guess we can just assume that there's nobody here. It's not like they'd be hiding for any reason. Or injured. This place seems peaceful enough, the distress call didn't hint at any kind of threat, and the welcoming committee definitely reinforced that image!" The pilot shouted.

Before Hank could retaliate, "We get it. We still have to search the floor, but it was worth a shot. Let's split up and-"

"I thought we were following the mute," the pilot grumbled. His foul mood was starting to irritate Chell. Maybe splitting up wouldn't be such a bad idea.

"Fair enough," Ganesh sighed. "What do you think?"

In the faint illumination of a nearby computer she nodded.

The pilot grunted. "Fine then. How do we do this, huh? A game of charades in the dark. Sounds great."

"It is not as though this requires much instruction. She could just hold up her fingers to show how many people go where. Or-"

Chell tuned out what the doctor was saying. There was an idea that was nagging at her that she just couldn't place. She wanted some way to communicate more specifically with everyone. She wanted to tell them what threats to expect from Aperture's security. She had to tell them how dangerous GLaDOS could be. She needed to tell them that any test subjects would be in the Enrichment Center underground. She had been trying to think of some way to communicate these things to them. Then it hit her. With so many computers giving off the only light in the room she should have thought of it sooner. She sat down at one of the desks and started typing.

An elbow from Hank brought the doctor's attention to an option he hadn't considered. He smiled sheepishly, not unlike Patel had earlier. "I suppose that is an option as well."

It had seemed like a reasonable way to communicate, but Chell quickly realized that the computer required some sort of password. The three men gathered around her realized this too.

"You wanna hit this one, too?" The pilot said to Hank.

"Thinking about it," he said, sounding a bit too serious for Chell's liking.

"Do you have any idea what it might be?" Ganesh inquired. Chell shrugged.

She thought she might be able to just use the password login to tell them what she wanted to say, but the letters came out as dots on the screen. She tried typing everything that came to mind: cjohnson, caroline, password, glados, combustiblelemons, she even tried typing out what she remembered of the turrets' song. Nothing worked. Finally she sighed and gave up.

Apparently this was Hank's cue to whack the computer, knocking it onto the floor. The pilot's "what the hell, man?" was met with a simple, "worth a shot."

Maybe she could just point at the keyboard. It would be difficult in the dark, but it would get her message across. She was about to get their attention when Ganesh shushed the other two. He pointed at the computer on the floor. The orange screen flickered once, then changed to show an image that was all too familiar to Chell. A single yellow circle lit up on the screen. The rest was white. She was the only one who recognized the close-up of GLaDOS. The others had no idea what they were seeing. Their confusion only increased when the computer spoke.

"Aperture Science Log mmddyyyy: A package arrived today from Nevada. A man in black dropped it off outside the main entrance. I sent a Party Escort Associate to collect it. There was a note attached. It said _use this wisely_. There is no wiser use for anything than Science. Testing will begin immediately."

The voice cut out and the image returned to the orange screen from before.

The four stood in silence for a moment, although Chell felt a burning desire to explain what they'd seen. Even if she didn't know what the package might be, she wanted to at least explain who had been speaking.

Then the pilot broke the silence. "Seriously? Do you solve all your problems with violence?"

"It works," was Hank's only response.

"Well, that was interesting, but perhaps we should focus again on how to communicate with our guide. We can come back to this odd message later."

Before Chell could bring everyone's attention to the keyboard, another voice came from the computer. This time it was the masculine voice of the PA system, and it came from every computer in the room.

"Attention. Unauthorized access to recording files is prohibited. Assuming Black Mesa protocol. Lethal force authorized to repel Black Mesa spies. If you are in fact an Aperture employee and you have simply forgotten your password, just type your password into the automated defense emergency deactivation terminal. In the case that you lack level 3 clearance, God help you."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Demanded the pilot. He got his answer when Hank tackled him to the ground.

"Down!"

A beep was their only warning. Chell realized what was happening then and pulled the doctor to the floor with her. She was reminded of her first time outside of the Test Chambers. She'd forgotten entirely about _this_ threat.

As the pilot shouted obscenities, a projectile whizzed over the four and smashed into one of the cubicles. It exploded sending papers, desk parts, and bits of cubicle flying everywhere. The resulting boom drowned out the pilot's most recent exclamation and Ganesh's gasp.

"What was that!" The pilot practically screamed. "What the hell was that!"

"It sounded like a rocket," Ganesh said as another beep was followed shortly by a second exploding cubicle. Minced office supplies rained down on them.

"We've gotta get outta here!" The pilot shouted over a third explosion. He could barely be heard over the boom.

"If we crawl back the way we came we should be fine. Whatever is firing seems to be firing parallel to the ground."

"Good thinking, doc." Hank shouted. "I'll catch up with you three once I take care of this bastard."

"It's a machine, Hank!" Whatever protest the doctor might have had in mind went unheard by the soldier as he crawled toward the source of the rockets. Ganesh sighed. "Should we help him?"

"Let's just get outta here," the pilot suggested as another boom shook the room. "Hank can take care of himself. If he says he'll catch up with us he will."

The doctor sighed again. "Very well. Lead the way."

The three crawled for the door they'd come from. Just as they reached it there was a series of bangs that reminded Chell of the more common turrets. Then an explosion from further away in the room was met with a triumphant, "Ooh-rah!"

Hank walked into view shortly afterward, making his way over the remains of a smoldering cubicle and kicking half a computer out of his path. "What're you lying around for?" He asked the three of them. Let's move." He stepped over each of them and headed for the stairs going down.

"What about searching the rest of the floor?" Ganesh asked, jumping to his feet. Chell and the pilot followed.

"If no one came out to help us after that they deserve to get left behind."

"Makes sense to me," the pilot muttered and went after Hank.

"What about splitting up and-"

Before anyone could argue further, Chell cut in with a shake of the head. The doctor saw this and nodded.

"I suppose we should stick together then. No sense in putting ourselves in more danger."

As they went after the other two Chell pointed down. Not just down the stairs, but straight down. Ganesh pondered this for a moment, then said to the others, "I think she wants us to go to the main floor." She nodded.

"You don't wanna check for more death traps, doc?" the pilot asked sarcastically, to which Chell suppressed a groan. She'd had her fill of sarcasm.

"I believe there is something important on the ground floor that Chell wants us to find." Chell nodded again, although no one was looking this time. Hopefully there would be some way into the test chambers from above ground. There were elevators all over the Enrichment Center from what she remembered. At least one of them must lead to this building. How else would that robot have been able to drag her back into the relaxation chamber?

"Whatever, doc." Hank's voice was tinged with apathy. The pilot just grunted. These two were really starting to get on Chell's nerves. At least Hank had been helpful, but that didn't make his attitude any less irritating.

As they reached the next floor, a muffled beep and a boom that sounded more like a thud emanated from behind a closed door labeled **TEST ANALYTICS**. Similar noises echoed up the stair well.

"That's a good policy," the pilot griped. "Tired accountant forgets his password and you blow the whole place up. No wonder someone sent a distress signal. They probably caused this disaster themselves." The pilot had no idea how right he was. Chell knew Aperture had caused plenty of its own problems under Cave Johnson's lead and GLaDOS's guidance, and the time Wheatley was in control nearly lead to a nuclear meltdown. What had GLaDOS done now that she needed help?

The four kept moving past other doors on their way to the ground floor. Nothing eventful happened during their descent accompanied by the cacophony of explosions until they reached the second floor. There, the door blew off its hinges and a rocket flew into the stairwell. Luckily the group was still on the stairs leading down, but the explosion still shook them and sent the doctor tumbling down to rest near the door. He groaned slightly as he rose to his feet.

"You okay, doc?" the pilot asked as the others made their way to his position by the doorway.

"Fine," he replied weakly. "I have never had the best balance. I only bumped my head. I have hit it much harder before."

Hank lifted him to his feet. "Let's get moving before it aims at the door again."

The final leg of the descent brought them to a vast area with blue tiled floor and dead potted plants. Along the wall to their left were a few revolving doors; the massive 'r' was visible beyond them blocking the exits. The other side of the room was shrouded in complete darkness. A single secretary's desk across from the stairs was one of the few features of the room and the only light in the room came from the computer sitting there.

"I don't like this," Hank muttered. "It's too open. One of those auto turrets could pop up anywhere. They could be waiting on the dark side of the room for us to move where there's no cover."

The pilot nodded, but Ganesh's attention was elsewhere. Chell looked where he was looking. The pilot and Hank followed suit. The four of them stood thinking for a moment until Ganesh finally said, "Well that seems out of place."

Chell had to agree. She'd seen other graffiti in the test chambers, but this looked different. It seemed to be a chalk drawing of an arrow shaped like a lightning bolt. It was drawn across the front of the secretary's desk and it pointed off into the darkness.

"What do you suppose it means?" When Hank looked at the pilot like he was crazy, he got defensive. "Well it looks like a deliberately drawn sign. Aperture doesn't seem too big on aesthetics," he said, waving a hand toward the bare white walls. "So it must be there for a reason."

"I think you are right," Ganesh muttered, a hand stroking his chin. "This arrow is not a normal part of this facility's signage. Someone has drawn it here for the sake of directing us, or perhaps for the sake of other employees. Regardless, if my hunch is correct, then this sign may be pointing toward the fuse box or some other means of reactivating the electricity."

"Just because it's a lightning bolt, doc? That could mean anything." Hank wasn't assured.

"Either that is where the power is or it is warning of electrocution, and if it were the latter then why make it an arrow?" While the doctor had intended this statement to reassure his companions, the pilot now seemed put off by the possible threat of electrocution. "We should follow the arrow."

"I'm not so sure about that, doc," the pilot said.

"Seems like a trap to me," Hank said firmly. "Why should we blindly trust Aperture when their turrets have already tried to kill us twice?"

"If we do not find the power, we are just going to keep arguing here in the dark, and we will never find anyone," Ganesh protested.

"Sounds good to me. I say we forget about Aperture personnel and just worry about getting the hell out of here."

"Yeah, why should we give a damn about the people trying to kill us?"

"We could not leave even if the helicopter was not a smoking wreck. We must complete the mission assigned to us. Then we will worry about how to leave. And we have already been over the fact that Aperture's employees are not the ones trying to kill us. Perhaps the emergency is the fact that the automated systems are out of control."

"Well if the automated systems are out of control, maybe there's a reason the power's off, huh?"

Suddenly the three men found themselves blinking back tears. Chell had gotten tired of their bickering and slunk off in the direction the arrow pointed. At first it had been hard to see, but her eyes had adjusted to the darkness and she was able to follow the wall to a metal box at shoulder height. It, too, seemed out of place. There was some writing on it, but the letters didn't spell any words Chell knew. It probably just said high voltage. Chell shrugged and pulled the switch.

Hank was the quickest to recover, sweeping the room with his weapon ready to fire as soon as his sight returned. He could now see Chell where the room had initially been pitch black. Two other new developments were visible as well: The little metal box next to Chell and the larger metal rectangle embedded in the previously unseen wall.

Once Ganesh recovered, he found himself smiling despite the slight irritation in his eyes. He had hoped Chell would make the group's decision for them. She seemed more like the type who preferred action over words, though not just because she couldn't speak. As he surveyed the room, he saw the pilot wiping his eyes with his hands and Hank moving past Chell toward what looked like an elevator. Chell noticed this too, and the doctor could see a look of triumph mixed with something like reluctance. This must be their ticket to the missing employees in distress. He said as much to the pilot.

"I think we are another step closer to finding Aperture's missing personnel."

"I think we're another step closer to getting killed," was his grumbled response as he blinked his vision clear. "How do we know the elevator won't just drop us to our deaths?"

The sound of static filled their ears accompanied by muffled coughs. "Ten bucks says you all die." Another cough was cut off as Hank snatched up a radio from his belt.

"Fifty bucks says we live," he deadpanned.

"You're on!" The redhead was interrupted by another fit of coughs and then another voice took his place.

"The signal isn't very strong, but I thought you'd like to know our patient is stable," Patel said confidently. "We've been hearing a lot of noise from down stairs, so I figured I should check in on you, too. Mr. O'Neil's timely recovery is just a bonus."

Ganesh rushed over to the elevator and Hank relinquished the radio.

"Yes we are all fine. Even if the patient is conscious he should still rest. It's too dangerous to descend those stairs with the automated defense system online. You'll want to stay put until we return. We should be able to find some way to deactivate the turrets."

"What model are they?" Patel was off in his own little world again. "Are they the failed commercial line, or the-"

"Focus on the patient, Dr. Patel," Ganesh scolded. "Now, we have found an elevator which I assume will lead to some subterranean portion of the facility. Perhaps there is some sort of panic room and if so it serves to reason that there might also be some way to control the automated systems. If we find a way to shut them down we will. Until then, stay put, and see to it that the patient remains in stable condition."

Without waiting for a reply, Ganesh returned the radio to Hank. He was about to say something to Chell when the pilot asked, "If there's a way to deactivate the-"

"Only speculation on my part," Ganesh conceded. "If it keeps Patel from running into a rocket while we are gone, then that is good enough."

"So they're the rocket models! Very interesting. I thought they'd discontinued-"

"If it actually exists, even better. It would be reasonable, after all. Unfortunately I don't think reasonable is the norm at Aperture. Regardless," he turned to Chell. "Do you think it is likely that we will find survivors or whoever sent the distress call beneath the facility?"

She nodded with certainty. It was clear that there wasn't a doubt in her mind. The doctor accepted this with a nod of his own, reaffirmed by a grunt from the pilot, and pointed to the button that sat on the wall beside the elevator doors.

It appeared oddly out of place; a simple red button marked DOWN did not seem to belong in a place where high-tech lethal sentries guarded offices with rockets. Then again, the bizarre emergency power contingency and the assault-to-access password interface didn't really fit the image of a revered technological industry either. However strangely simple the thing might seem, it didn't really matter. After all, Ganesh mused, the simplest of actions could lead to quite complex situations.

Those were the thoughts that crossed Ganesh's mind as Chell pushed the little red button. With an almost instantaneous _whoosh_ the doors opened and a transparent cylinder locked into place having risen from below. The cylinder's own doors slid apart to allow the four to enter.

"Here we go then," the pilot muttered. "Looks a bit cramped.

"You'd better have that fifty bucks ready for me when you hit the bottom," the redhead coughed.

"I'm not losing any more money to you today," Hank shot back into the radio.

The four shuffled into the waiting elevator a bit awkwardly. Chell had remembered the elevator being much more spacious when it was just her running through test course after test course. Something told her that the portal tests had not been designed to test four people simultaneously.

Somehow they all managed to squeeze in without crushing each other. Chell endured the pilot's complaining, Hank's stoic refusal to move once inside, and Ganesh's peculiar desire to make his way from the front to the back and around the entire car. Finally they all settled in with Chell at the front, the pilot and the doctor standing next to each other, and the soldier in the back. Once they were all settled in, Ganesh asked the question which he had been looking to answer.

"How do we make it close?"

His question was answered suddenly when the doors hissed closed and the cylinder dropped. It was falling at an alarming rate, but it was a controlled descent. The pilot was the last to realize this, and so he was the last one to stop screaming profanities.

The first was Ganesh, who seemed a bit shocked with himself. "Excuse me," was all he said after that.

Hank was the second, though he wasn't swearing for the same reason as the others. He wasn't screaming either. He just kept mumbling, "Damn, I can't afford this," until he realized that they were slowing down without hitting something solid first.

Chell, though she said nothing, was the third. She couldn't voice her thoughts, but they were her thoughts nonetheless. In her mind she was screaming. The sudden drop reminded her of her fall from GLaDOS's chamber. She hadn't been quite so scared at the time. Sure, there was a moment of brief terror when she'd thought _I'm going to die_, but then she remembered the portal gun and the long fall boots and she realized she would survive just as she'd survived every other pit fall, literal and figurative, that she'd faced.

This time there was no portal gun and there were no long fall boots. It was just her and gravity, and gravity was looking for payback after all the times she'd defied it. The worst part of this was that she couldn't think of a way out of it. Every other time she had managed to think quickly and take action to escape what would normally constitute imminent death. Now, despite all she'd been through, she was about to die in the place she'd only just escaped.

Except she didn't die. She realized as the doctor placed his hand on her shoulder that their fall was slowing gradually. She also realized she'd been cringing. She felt pathetic thinking back only a few moments ago. She took a deep breath and regained her composure. If she was going to be stuck here again, she would just have to remain as stoic as before. She wouldn't show any more signs of weakness, and she wouldn't give up like that again.

"Are you okay?" the doctor asked over the shouts that Hank was trying to muffle from the pilot. She just nodded, the fear in her eyes replaced by determination. Then the lift stopped.

It was rather abrupt and the whole car shook. Ganesh had to grab the pilot's shirt and Chell's shoulder to remain upright. As he embarrassedly apologized the doors slid open to reveal a round room. The wall was covered by darkened screens with the exception of a few that showed the black and white dots that accompanied the faint hum of static. The stairs that Chell knew led to one of the test chambers were dark as was the door beyond them. Stale air filtered into the car. It was tinged with a smell that made Chell feel queasy, though she didn't let it show. The pilot did with a grimace as did the doctor.

"Something's rotting down here," the pilot grunted. "Things just keep getting better."

A distant moaning caught the group's attention. It was followed by a muffled bang. Someone was knocking on the door.

The pilot and Hank eyed the room beyond the elevator warily while the doctor only patted Chell's shoulder. He smiled nervously.

"Ladies first."

**To those of you who have set alerts for this story: First, I thank you. Second, I hope you're enjoying. Third, I apologize if my updates are not as frequent as you would like.**


	4. The Separation

**More violence ahead. Whose ready to see some zombies? Alright, now if you'll just sign this waiver… no need to try reading it. Lab boys told me it's impossible for the unaided eye to make out that fine print.**

**The Separation**

Chell took a few tentative steps out of the elevator. She still felt a bit shaky from the descent, but her steps were firm and she didn't waiver as she exited the chamber lock. As she took her third step forward, a hissing noise caught her attention. She turned to see Hank pull the doctor back just as the doors snapped shut. His wide-eyed expression was the last thing she saw before they plummeted out of sight. She stood staring for a while, shock unperturbed by the constant static and the repeated thumps of flesh on metal. Only when the static faded to be replaced by _her_ voice was Chell jolted from her stupor. _Her _familiar white visage filled the previously blank screens as _she_ began to speak.

"Aperture Science Log mmddyyyy: At first the package seemed unimportant; within the cardboard box was a wooden toy box. However, upon further inspection the contents of the toy box proved to be very scientific: A meteorite. I have identified the substance as ununpentium. Unlike previously synthesized atoms, this ununpentium showed uncharacteristic stability. Also peculiar: no alpha, beta, or gamma radiation detected. Frequent electrical discharge suggests the potential energy within. A sample has been extracted for further testing."

It was _her _fault that Chell was back in this hellhole, and it was _her_ fault that she'd just watched three men who'd put their trust in her fall to what could be their deaths. Even if the elevator didn't crash, they'd probably end up in some unsolvable deathtrap without the aid of the Portal Device. Had this been _her_ plan all along? Was _she _just trying to lure Chell in, kill her friends and resume testing?

No. Chell took a deep breath. She'd seen the video and she'd heard the sincerity in the AI's cry for help. Getting angry at _her_ wouldn't help the situation. She had to focus.

If she could just make her way through the test chamber to the exit elevator perhaps she'd find her friends in the next test. If not, she'd still have to continue on for her own sake and for the other subjects, if they existed.

With the absence of speech and static, Chell was left with only one noise assaulting her ears. The incessant drumming could not be ignored any longer. Perhaps it was one of the test subjects trapped in the chamber. There was only one way to find out.

With the rifle in her hands in place of the portal gun, she climbed the stairs to the door. The latch in the center spun and the doors slid apart as she approached revealing a hunched silhouette inside the dark room. Apparently the power hadn't been restored fully to the facility. Now that Chell thought about it, it seemed pretty unlikely that the entire facility's power supply would be controlled by one switch in the portion above ground meant to deter prying eyes. Why else would there be a shaft full of switches to flip when she and Wheatley accidentally activated GLaDOS?

She took another step forward and the figure lifted its head to look at her. That's when she realized something was wrong. Glowing yellow eyes stared at her from the darkness. Then the sign lit up announcing that this was Test Chamber 01, and Chell saw the figure before her with horrible clarity. He looked haggard; his clothes were torn and stained with blood. Through the tears in his shirt Chell could see gaping wounds in his torso and on his face and hands there were scratches and large spots missing skin. The stench that the pilot had identified as decay was coming from this person staring at Chell with unnatural yellow eyes. As she made these observations, the man opened his mouth, revealing teeth rotten or missing as well as releasing more foul air, and let loose a yell. It was the noise of an animal, not a man, and as he lunged for her, loose rotting flesh flapping from the hands he thrust forward, Chell squeezed the trigger on the gun.

The effect was immediate and somewhat startling. She'd known what the gun was meant to do; She'd decided from the noise that Hank's had made that it couldn't be too different in function from the turrets. She was still taken aback by the spurts of blood that accompanied the noise of her weapon as bullets found their mark. Even with the rounds she'd put in the lurching enemy, he still reached out and grabbed for her. She pulled back just far enough. She could feel the cold, clammy touch of his fingers brushing her arm.

The man fell to the ground, dead she assumed, but then he grabbed for her ankles. Chell fired once more into the back of his head as she stepped back again. The bullets must make a disgusting noise, she thought as her target slumped to the ground with three in his head, but she couldn't hear it over the deafening sound of the weapon firing. For this reason she was thankful, but that didn't make her ears hurt less.

The man seemed dead for sure this time, but she was still cautious as she made her way around his body to the first Test Chamber. She remembered it vaguely from her previous trek through the Enrichment Center. After a short drop from the entrance to the actual test floor, she had to use portals to move a Weighted Storage Cube onto a button to open a door. Luckily this test didn't require the use of the portal gun. A button was pushed that opened a portal to allow her to grab a cube that she moved to another room through another portal. Once that was done a third portal would be opened and lead to the exit.

Simple enough, but when she pressed the button to open the portal only one portal appeared. It was inside the room with the Weighted Storage Cube and it flickered yellow before winking out of existence. The same thing happened when she pressed the button for the portal in the room with the cube's counterpart. Similarly, a yellow portal opened in the room with the exit. This time it remained stable long enough for someone, or something, to limp out.

The yellow eyed man looked similar to the other one she'd killed, except that the holes ripped in his clothes and body were in different places. The man limped around the little room until he bumped into the glass. He tried again to move forward only to stumble back again. Then he noticed Chell on the other side of the glass. Without a second's pause he reared back one arm and lashed out at her. The glass cracked, and Chell jumped back. She wondered, not for the first time, what that deranged AI had done now. She could hear the same animal scream, only slightly muffled by the wall of glass, as it made a motion as if to tear the wall from its path. Despite the oddity of the action, it was still sufficient to shatter the barrier.

Chell stepped back further and shielded her eyes from the shards of glass with her arm. Unfortunately, this meant that she had only one hand to support the rifle, and it was heavier than the portal device. The rifle dipped and the shots she fired only shattered some of the glass her enemy hadn't broken and sent it tinkling to the floor in pieces. She had to swing the gun up with both arms as he approached, faster than his predecessor had been. She fired again and this time the weapon was on target. The creature, she was sure it wasn't human anymore if it ever had been, let out a dying groan as it crumpled to the floor in a pool of its own blood.

Pushing past the slight shock of the attack, she focused on solving the test. Seeing the thing smash through the glass gave her an idea. Following Hank's example, she thought wryly, she fired several shots into the glass separating her from the cube. It wasn't bulletproof. Once she was past avoiding the larger shards of glass, she realized that she didn't have the portal device to help her lift the cube. It couldn't be too heavy though, could it? After all, she had gone through this test before without the portal gun, and she had no trouble with it then.

It soon became apparent that the cube was heavier than before. Maybe it was supposed to match her weight as one of the AI's demoralizing mind games. Despite her taunts, or perhaps because of them, she knew she wasn't that heavy. One of the scientists at White Forest had even informed her after her exam that she was a perfectly healthy weight. When she'd asked, a little embarrassed, if he was sure she wasn't fat he'd scoffed and said if anything she was malnourished.

Her weight didn't really matter, though. The problem was her strength. Apparently all of the running around she'd done for the tests hadn't done much to improve her upper body. She managed to lift it with a lot of straining and sweating, but she only made it two steps before she dropped it, almost crushing her toes. She was thinking about kicking it when she heard a portal open. She looked up to see another deformed man climbing through a yellow quantum space hole. She picked up her rifle in no real hurry. She could wait for it to break the glass, and then kill it. No sense in rushing its inevitable attack. This one seemed to be using less force, beating at the glass repeatedly and slowly spreading the spider web of cracks.

Just as it looked like the glass would lose its battle against the relentless pounding another portal opened. Chell spun around to find a mass of rot and disease charging at her. She fired at it and its fresh wounds spat blood as it fell dead, but when she turned to shoot the other one, now free of its glass prison, the weapon in her hands simply clicked. The figure, though limping and lacerated, showed no signs of new wounds apart from glass shards in his hands.

It dawned on Chell that these guns, unlike the portal device, needed ammo. They had to be reloaded, and as her foe limped closer she struggled to recall how it was done. When the thing was a few feet away, she remembered seeing Hank unload Ganesh's gun for the extra bullets. It seemed so long ago. Pushing aside wandering thoughts, she repeated the action to remove the empty clip, groped in her pocket for one of the spares Hank had distributed, and slapped the new one in place. Before it could so much as open its mouth to scream its awful scream she took aim and obliterated its face.

The rifle and the portal device might be different guns in many ways; they shot different things, used different ammo, and had different weights, but in the end all that mattered was aiming and firing. As long as she hit her mark she'd survive.

Now to solve the test. She gave the cube one last cursory glance and a kick that left her with a slight pain in the toe before deciding that an alternative was needed. Unfortunately she could see only one. Well, three technically, but all with the same end result of revulsion. She chose the body closest to the button, found a spot where its clothes weren't completely stained with blood, and started dragging. As long as she focused on the destination and not her cargo she was able to resist the urge to vomit.

Once she'd lugged the corpse onto the button the lights along the floor went from blue to orange, not yellow, and the door parted to let her through to the chamber lock. She was wondering why the portals were yellow when the Material Emancipation Grill sprung to life. It too had a yellow tinge to it. She sat there a moment wondering if it was safe to proceed, just as she had in her first encounters with most Aperture technology. From when she'd first come across the portal in her little relaxation chamber to, thankfully, the energy pellets. While the latter had proven fatal, it shouldn't be compared to the Emancipation Grill. After all, it was meant to be passed through by test subjects, and she'd never felt the supposed side effects before. But what if this yellow version had some horrific side effect like melting her nails or incinerating her hair?

At the sound of more portals opening, it occurred to her: what if it made her like _them_? All four portals in the room were open including the one right next to her. She shot the limping figure that emerged only to watch as another stumbled over the corpse. She shot that one, too, but a third took its place. Casting her gaze to the center of the room she saw that nine others had filed in through yellow portals. Some screamed, others groaned, most limped, and a few were running.

She killed the one closest to her and shot through to kill a fourth as still more poured into the room. She shot two of the faster ones and a few that were getting too close, then turned to find two more right next to her reaching for her with bloody bony hands. She shot one but the other got off with an empty _click_. She was being swarmed and out of ammo. She couldn't reload in time with a bloody claw of a hand swiping at her. She had to make a choice fast, and she decided that she would rather take her chances with the yellow particle field than the horde of yellow eyed freaks.

She ducked under the arm coming at her and sprinted through the Emancipation Grill, happily noting that her teeth, nails, hair, skin, and ear tubes seemed to be intact. She took the stairs three at a time and didn't so much as think of glancing over her shoulder until she heard the elevator doors close behind her. She turned at the sound of a high-pitched shriek that sounded strange even for these monsters. What she saw was both immensely disturbing and greatly relieving until her relief was overwhelmed by disgust.

The one that had tried to grab her was the source of the noise. He'd tried to follow her into the chamber lock and now he was shaking violently and rising slowly from the floor. Suspended in the Emancipation Grill, the man gradually disintegrated. First his skin was zapped away to reveal a red sinewy interior. Muscles, nerves, and organs fried in the yellow particle field until nothing was left but bone. Thankfully, bodily fluids must have disintegrated early on, because there was no sign of any liquid in the mess. As it was Chell was barely holding down her last meal, which she was now glad had been a small one. Finally the skeleton blackened and fizzled away leaving nothing but the yellow Emancipation Grill- and the dozen or so men approaching it from the other side. Ignoring the horrible demise her previous pursuer, they shuffled mindlessly forward.

Just as the first one came into contact with the Grill and she looked away, she felt a heaving sensation in her gut. It wasn't vomit, though. The elevator had simply begun its descent; a significantly slower descent than the other elevator had provided. With a sigh of relief, she released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding and reloaded her gun. Feeling only a few other cartridges in her pocket, she realized that most of the salvaged ammo was with Hank. Even so she hoped the others wouldn't run into any of the decaying yellow eyed freaks like she had.

On the bright side, Chell realized, she had solved a test without portals, so there was hope for them yet if they didn't die in the elevator. She had to find them. She had brought them here and she would get them out of here. After all, she had escaped before. She just had to find them, then find GLaDOS, give her what she wanted, and demand to leave safely. The elevator came to a full halt, but the doors didn't open. Chell was hardly surprised when the screens lit up with AI's 'head' in the center of each one. Once again she spoke without emotion, yet still managed to sound sarcastic.

"Aperture Science Log mmddyyyy: Subjects exposed directly to the meteorite appear to be unaffected by the substance. One subject managed to shock himself, but beyond that no effects have been observed. Scans indicate that weapons concealed in the toy box and infused with ununpentium are more powerful than those not infused. Therefore I have decided to test its practicality in weapons development. Yesterday, ununpentium infused Resolution Pellets proved less effective than predicted. Sentry Turrets loaded with ununpentium infused Resolution Pellets resolved Test Subjects at the same rate as those in the control group. Today, High Energy Pellets were shown to vaporize test subjects just as effectively without exposure to ununpentium. Tomorrow, I'm going to grind up part of the meteorite and mix the dust with the deadly neurotoxin. I have high expectations for this test."

Despite the anger she felt at knowing more people had died testing, she pushed past the emotion to think. Thinking about what she'd just heard, Chell couldn't bring herself to ask more than one question. Sure, she wondered what ununpentium was and where this meteorite had come from. She wondered why there were weapons concealed in a toy chest and what all of this had to do with the distress call. She wondered what had turned men into mindless monsters, but in the end these wonderings all lead back to one big question. What had that deranged computer done?

The recording turned to static and suddenly the elevator was plummeting. Shaken from her thoughts, Chell felt the familiar sense of determination. No matter what her old nemesis had done, and no matter what she would face in the next test chamber, she would take it head on. She hadn't failed yet, and she didn't plan to.

**Quick note: I'm not sure if I used chamber lock correctly. Correct me if it doesn't mean elevator along with more other grammar punc,tuati'on or speling erurs. **

**Also, I hope this wasn't too graphic for you. By the way, those of you with weak constitutions may want to look away. Too late? Should've read the waiver.**


	5. The Pilot

**It's short, and it's late, but it's here!**

**The Pilot**

The doctor gulped as the doors slammed shut where he'd been standing only moment's ago. He wasn't sure how much force it exerted, but he was sure it would be enough to crush him or snap him in two. Smiling nervously, he turned to face his savior.

"That would have been most inconvenient. Thank you."

The soldier only stared. "You own me one," he said, fully meaning it. Ganesh could only think to nod as their surroundings shifted. Walls shot up around them.

The elevator was falling again and thus the pilot was screaming again. He'd at least decided to switch out the expletives for, "Not like this," but he was just as loud as before if not louder. Finally, after a grand two seconds, Hank snapped.

"Dammit man! You can fly a flaming helicopter through heavy artillery and crash it into a building without breaking a sweat, but you can't handle a ride in an elevator without screaming your lungs out?"

The pilot put his screams on hiatus long enough to explain. The terror was still evident in his wide eyes and quavering voice. "In the chopper I was in control. I was fightin' the old bird, but I was in control." The words poured out more rapidly the longer he spoke. "Now we're stuck in this Godamn fun house from hell falling to our deaths, and I can't do a damn thing! So excuse me if I'm unhappy about dying!"

He was about to start screaming again when the soldier socked him in the jaw. The doctor jumped, and the pilot, nursing a bleeding lip, shouted, "What the hell was that for!"

"To shut you up," Hank shouted back. "Seems pretty obvious." The pilot looked ready to retaliate, and he might have if it weren't for his hands' preoccupation with gun and jaw. Before he could free up one of them Ganesh cut in.

"We need to calm down and take a look at the facts here," he said as calmly as he could. "Yes we are trapped in this elevator, and yes we are falling at an accelerated rate."

"You're not helping," the pilot spat.

"However," the doctor continued, "we know that the elevator has stopped before after travelling at similar speed, and it is not unreasonable to assume that it will stop again."

"Oh great. Thanks, doc! I can _assume_ we'll live. _Maybe _we'll survive. It's possible. This elevator's just gonna stop and let us out. We _might _be waltzing out of here into the lobby any second. I suppose there's gonna be refreshments waiting for us! It's a possibility that we won't be crushed to death in this glass death trap!"

"Actually, I am fairly certain that the initial impact would kill us well before we could be crushed."

"How Godamn reassuring!"

"Wait, what I meant was, er, there is a chance that the elevator might even sustain such an impact, um, but I am pretty sure we wouldn't, well-"

The elevator jerked to a stop. The doors slid apart with a thud. Hank grabbed Ganesh as he stumbled forward predictably. He hadn't thought to grab the pilot, who practically leapt through the doors in his scramble to get out.

"You crazy-" whatever Hank was about to say was cut off as the doors resealed and the elevator plummeted once more, taking the doctor and the soldier with it. If they wanted to die in an elevator, fine, but they weren't taking him down with them. Let the damn doctor hope that thing stopped again, but the pilot wasn't going to subscribe to the same faith in chance. He was going to survive, just like he always had.

So now he was alone in the dark room, or so it seemed. He was never really alone, he had learned. Not since he picked up his shadow during the Black Mesa Incident. His scowl deepened at the thought of Black Mesa. His file might say his flight experience was with "channel seven," but in reality he'd spent his years flying Apaches for the high profile personnel and clients of Black Mesa. Hank may have lived through the horrors of the Seven Hour War, but the pilot had seen his own half acre of hell escaping ground zero of the invasion.

He realized he'd been standing in silence for a long time. The elevator was long gone, and there were no signs of anyone else in the round room. For a moment he thought maybe he really was alone. After all, how could anyone have followed him here? How could that bastard have avoided the enormous turrets when flying was practically suicide? How could he have entered the building without Aperture's password? How could he have bypassed the elevator when the power had only just been turned on? The voice dismissed his doubts as expected; the man it belonged to stepped out of the shadows.

"Abandoning your… friends again, I see." He shouldn't have been startled, but he was. The bizarre cadence of his voice was always unsettling.

"It's not my fault they weren't fast enough," He said through gritted teeth.

"I seem to recall you've had… a similar experience with an elevator." He shouldn't have been surprised by the jibe either. _The screams of men he once knew as they fell behind him; at least this elevator was sound proof._ The contrast of his voice to his otherwise orderly appearance, with business suit and military crew cut, added to the unease the pilot always felt in his presence.

"It wasn't my fault then, and it isn't my fault now."

"No matter. If previous… encounters are any indication, your friends will live… for now. I'm sure they'll prove adequate."

"What are you-"

A voice cut him off, echoing around the chamber. It only took him a moment to recognize it as the one form the computer earlier. "Aperture Science Log mmddyyyy: The ununpentium-neurotoxin mixture was a success. At first glance it was a failure. The vital signs of test subjects in the test group terminated just as quickly as those in the control group. However, after the test the vital signs of subjects in the test group returned. Albeit at a much lower level than those of people normally considered 'alive,' but that does not diminish the value of what has been learned from this test. Ununpentium does have applications in the field of reanimation."

"What is going on here?" The pilot demanded. He was, not for the first time, baffled. What were these messages for anyway, and who was sending them? "Do you have something to do with this?"

The pilot's companion did not answer him. Instead, adjusting his tie, he launched into a lecture. "Very few men are as… fortunate… as you. There were hundreds of men at Black Mesa, smarter and stronger than you, but my… employers trusted me to choose from those few who could survive… to serve us best in the future. Some were smart, others were strong, but only a select few exhibited… the proper traits. You… were fast and willing to press onward despite… dire circumstances. You were able to adapt to survive. You'll need to be capable… if you're going to make it out of here and serve your purpose." The final _s_ was sustained in a hiss. He couldn't tell if it was meant to unnerve him or not, but it did.

"And what exactly do you expect me to do?"

"What you've always done." These were his mysterious "friend's" parting words as he smiled, a sinister look, and slipped back into the shadows he'd come from, dark blue suit blending into the darkness. The pilot tried to follow him, but only ran into a wall.

"Cryptic bastard."

He hated being left in the dark. He supposed he would just have to illuminate things for himself, and on that note he remembered the light attached to his rifle. It flicked on and a white circle swept the room around him. There was no trace of his stalker, not that he expected to find any. He did, however, find a door.

His elusive acquaintance's escape route was unknown, like everything else about the man. The elevator clearly wasn't an option. The pilot couldn't see any other choice. As he approached, the door split apart, treating the pilot to the image of a little blue man being torn in half. Pushing the morbid thought aside, he focused on what was beyond the doors: a dimly lit office area like the one above.

Unlike the one he'd seen before, this office was much less organized. Desks were piled in front of the door, and peering through the gaps revealed an odd sight. The computer monitors that lit the room were strewn about the floor, mixed with office supplies, and tin cans. He thought he could see something on one of the walls, lit by three orange screens tilted up; there was some sort of graffiti, red splashes and scribbles of paint. At least, he thought it was paint. He'd seen plenty of blood on his way out of Black Mesa, and this didn't look quite the same. On the other hand, Black Mesa had better lighting, and a short beep made him quickly rethink the situation.

He dived away from the door as the piled up desks exploded in a shower of splinters. No one was there to hear it, but he still let a "son of a bitch" slip. Sitting beside the door, back against the wall, he decided that he couldn't go that way. At the same time, seeing the empty elevator shaft and the empty room around it, he realized he had to go that way. It was a choice between the possibility of death by being blown apart, or waiting to starve slowly but surely. He'd had the same choice to make in Black Mesa, and those turrets had fired much faster.

Before any semblance of reason could stop him he got to his feet, rounded the corner, and fired where he thought the turret was. He was right, and the turret, which looked like a little metal eyeball, was soon covered in dents and dings, and the yellow lens at the center cracked, although many shots went wide. Then the light turned green, and the pilot noticed the red dot on his chest. He dived again just in time to avoid losing his torso. He still felt the heat on his back as the small missile rocketed by, and he felt the shockwave as it exploded on contact with the wall behind him.

He caught himself before he could fall on his face and pushed himself back onto his feet so that when the turret locked on again he was already out of the missile's path. He fired again, adding more craters to the machine. It was looking less spherical every second. The turret fired again, and the pilot realized that he was back where he'd started. He could dive back into the safety of the elevator room if he wanted to.

But he had this thing on the ropes! He was back in control. And as one last missile flew past, the 'pupil' of the giant eyeball took a bullet dead center. The light winked out, and the pilot let loose a quick "woop!" of triumph.

Once he'd reloaded and shouldered the rifle he decided to take a closer look at his surroundings. Roughly in the center of the room was the pock marked rocket turret. The recent fight hadn't helped the clutter in the room. With all of the cans, computers, and office supplies littering the room he was surprised he hadn't tripped in his panic.

The three computers he'd seen through the desks went largely untouched by the explosions that had rocked the room, except that one had been knocked off balance by a can; it flickered on its side, casting shadows at an odd angle. Their orange light shined on a mural of red and orange and black and yellow, and the other colors convinced the pilot that the red probably wasn't blood.

Probably.

It looked like a group of people. Four wore orange jumpsuits, some torn slightly. Their eyes were yellow, and their hands and faces were speckled with red. Looking closer, he saw that there was plenty of red on the jumpsuits, too. Their arms were outstretched, and their mouths gaped open, frozen in silent screams.

The lone figure ahead of the four was different. It wore a white coat, only marked by a few tiny specks of red. Wild blue eyes looked over it's shoulder at the arms reaching from the others. It was difficult to determine gender because of the generally disheveled appearance and the messy black hair that trailed behind the figure as if it were running at great speed.

The flickering computer screen added to this effect; the shadows jumped across the mural, making the figures appear to be moving. The pilot had to turn away. It was too eerie.

Further exploration of the room led the pilot to an alcove in the wall across from the door. He hadn't seen it before because it was hidden from the door, and it had been at his back for half of the shootout. Oddly enough, the door was where the figures in the mural were running to. They would never make it.

"Stop putting so much thought into a godamn painting!" He shouted, trying to clear his mind.

He focused his attention on moving forward. Once again, he couldn't see any other exits unless the elevator came back. And that was not happening.

Ever.

So, his decision forced again, he proceeded to the alcove grumbling all the way. He was not surprised to find another barricade of desks, but this time they didn't explode in his face. Thankful for the lack of shrapnel, but not quite trusting his luck, the pilot prodded the pile cautiously with his rifle. When there was no beep or boom he grew bolder, giving the desks a kick that drew a small creak from the painfully sturdy structure. Muttering curses under his breath, he decided that it was safe to assume no rockets were waiting on the other side. And if there were, his only other choice was good old starvation. Unless of course there was no fresh air in this part of the facility and he slowly suffocated.  
>He continued along this morbid line of thought as he shifted the desks until he realized that he really didn't want to think about his own death. Especially when the whole point of moving forward was to survive.<p>

Turning his thoughts to survival, he wondered what these desks were piled up for, and who had done the piling. He had flown into this hell hole for a reason, after all, albeit a reason that hadn't been explained. The only things he had to go on were possibly faulty defenses, makeshift barricades, and that damned elevator. It occurred to him that the same person who had cobbled together the barricades must have made the painting. A painting depicting bloodied figures chasing someone who looked terrified.

The pilot doubled his efforts, and soon enough there was a gap large enough to squeeze through without getting caught on a leg. Climbing hastily over what remained of the barrier, he found himself in a room that looked very out of place.

What should have been white walls were covered in paint. It wasn't like the other room where only one wall had been painted. Everywhere he looked, there was a mural to see. On the wall in front of him was a white figure. It definitely wasn't human. It was suspended from the 'ceiling' which had been painted so that it extended from the actual ceiling, and there was something about its shape that just looked... mechanical. Black paint separated the white of the figure from the white of the wall, branched off as what might have been tubes or wires, and made up the joints of the segmented figure. One detail registered as familiar as soon as he saw it. A yellow circle in the center of the smallest portion was the spitting image of the computer screen they'd seen in the main building. Surrounding the white figure, which must have been massive, were dozens of the anti-air turrets. The only difference was that they were white instead of gray. With red and yellow false eyes fixed on the doorway, on him, the pilot couldn't help but turn his attention elsewhere.

He found little comfort in the view to his right. What looked like the white coated figure from the other room was surrounded by more of the orange wearing people. A significant difference was that the ones in orange were prone in pools of red, with the exception of one. That one was having its already bloody face bashed in by the white coat, whose coat was noticeably redder. The white coat was using what looked like a box to kill the one in the jumpsuit. What made the sight even stranger was the little pink heart stenciled on the side of the blood stained box. Scribbled in black above the scene were the words, "Persevere despite. Persevere to spite," over and over.

Whether he did it simply to look away from the graphic image, or out of a morbid curiosity the pilot couldn't be sure. Either way, he found himself looking at the walls on either side of the desk barricade. Surprisingly, one side boar only an arrow pointing up. Looking up, he saw something circular sticking out of the ceiling. Not certain of what it was, he decided it would be best not to stand underneath it; it looked like it might open, and he didn't want to find out that its contents were heavy.

On the other side, however, was a picture that seemed even more out of place than the others. At least the previous murals had fit his image of disturbing reminders of Aperture inspired violence. This, however, was just... stupid. What looked like one of the anti-air turrets was accompanied by what looked vaguely like one of the rocket turrets. The major difference was the limbs. Both turrets had arms and legs, and both appeared to be waving. He couldn't think of what else one raised arm could mean. The limbs were so wiry, and the frames were poor fits. The color of the eyes were off as well. Rather than the Terminator Red shade, these things, robots, he guessed, had more pleasant orange and blue 'eyes.'

He was caught off guard by the final painting, since the one before it had been so innocent. This last one shared no trace of the friendly tone of its predecessor. It was like the one he'd seen when he first entered the room, but rather than turrets surrounding the central white figure there were dozens, maybe hundreds, of bloody figures in orange. They were much more tightly packed than the turrets had been, and a yellow cloud hung over them. Big black letters were scrawled across the top: "FUTILITY! TOO MANY!" Along the white 'body' of the machine were red letters that spiraled downward. "Failure failure failure..." on and on until the words reached the 'head' of the thing.

The pilot realized that something was different about this part, too. The yellow central 'eye' was the same, but the shape was all wrong. Rather than the rectangular shape of the other picture, this one was spherical like the rocket turrets.

As the pilot was about to take a closer look, a dull thud like a brick hitting pavement drew his attention. He turned just in time to have his weapon knocked from his hands by a blur of white and a flash of pink. Knocked of balance, he fell back and found himself with a free second to realize what was happening. With the mural in the background there was no doubt about it. Same wild eyes. Same black hair. Same prone victim.  
>He tried to bring his arms up, but it happened too quickly. The last thing he saw was the pink heart falling toward his face.<p>

He'd found the painter.


	6. The Survivor

**The Survivor **

The first thing that registered was a pounding headache. He tried to gripe, but all he could manage was a quiet groan. The next thing that registered was that he was on the cold hard floor. How had he gotten there? His memory was fuzzy. He tried to move but he was too disoriented. He opened his eyes, but his vision was blurry. There wasn't much to see, but there was a bleary pink and white shape in the light from his rifle.

Where was his rifle? Somewhere on the ground, he realized. Why was it on the ground? He had fallen. How had he fallen? The memory wouldn't come.

The pain in his head was more than an ache. It was a splitting pain and he tried to scream but it hurt to move his jaw.

The pink and white shape moved. That was when he noticed the noise.

Mumbling.

"…adosisgon…"

It was gibberish.

"…dedarisingami…buticant…no..."

Maybe it was just too quiet, or too fast. It sounded confused.

"…noshebroughtmeback…not…theyelloweyes…"

The confused mumbling pitched into an anguished scream and faded into sobs.

"What?" Finally he felt the strength to utter something, even if it wasn't quite what he wanted to say.

The sobbing stopped, and the pink-white blob shifted again, only now it was more focused, and clearly more white than pink. There was a significant amount of red in the mix.

"You're alive," the voice said. It sounded more shocked than pleased. "You're alive!" The second time around it sounded a bit happier, but there was still something else there. Wariness?

"What happened?" The question became rhetorical almost as soon as he said it. The pilot's mind finally out of its haze, he remembered the room with the paintings and the weight smashing against his head. "You hit me!" He scrambled frantically for his weapon for a moment before the pain drove him to a standstill. His hand, inches from his gun, flew to his head where the pain was centered. He expected a killing blow.

He was surprised when, rather than another bash to the head, he felt a hand on his shoulder then under his arm helping him to his feet. Had he been in a state to resist he would have been too shocked to do anything. He was surprised again when he found his rifle thrust into his hands, and the urge to take control finally reached his mind. He shoved away the helping hands and found himself sprawled on the floor opposite his white coated attacker-turned-helper.

Shining the light on his face, the pilot saw just what a mess the man was. His hair hadn't seen so much as a comb in some time. Dark circles outlined his bloodshot eyes, and something was off about his pupils; one eye seemed bigger than the other. There were several tears in his coat where the white was stained red. The dark red patches on the white fabric were clearly blood, though whether it was his or someone else's he couldn't be sure. A laminated ID clinging to his pocket labeled him as Doug Rattman. This guy was a survivor. The pilot could understand that. It didn't excuse the attempt on his life, though.

"We- I didn't know!" The man screamed. "I thought you were one of them." His eyes darted from the large cube beside him to the gun to the wall to his right. "You aren't one of them. Are you?"

"Who?" the pilot asked, glancing to the wall. Yellow eyes stared back at him.

"She woke me up. She needed help. I tried. Not enough. Too many. What could I do? I had to run. I had to live!" He broke off into whimpers.

"What the hell happened here?" The pilot was getting fed up with all of the communication problems. First the mute, then the cryptic, and now some crazy rambling psycho. He wanted answers, not puzzles and riddles.

Rather than answering, Doug screamed and scrambled to his feet. The pilot brought up his rifle, but before he could fire a hand on his shoulder caused him to turn. He stared into yellow eyes, just like the painting, except the picture hadn't captured the stench or the way the haggard body seemed to sag under its own weight or the way the lifeless yellow orbs seemed to focus on him with an unearthly hunger. He tried to move but a sickly hand batted away his weapon and another swung for his chest, claw-like fingers seeking flesh.

They did not find their mark. A white blur with a dash of pink struck the warped creature's head, knocking it off its feet with a spurt of red that joined the paint on the wall. The pilot found himself jerked around by the shoulder once more as Doug handed him his rifle. The scientist made sure that the pilot had a firm grip on his weapon, then made his way over to the box and the corpse. With a single violent lift and slam, he made certain that the thing would never walk again.

The pilot could not process the situation. Missiles, falling elevators, more missiles, mad men, and now… what? He wanted to ask even as part of his brain told him he would get no answer, but his internal debate was cut short by a strangled sob from Doug.

"If one knows, they all know. They could be here any second. Quickly!" The pilot could only follow as Doug made his way to the circular protrusion from the ceiling. Doug whispered apologetically to the box, set it down and stood on it. He reached up, flipped open a small panel, and fiddled with something the pilot couldn't make out. The circle opened like the shutter of a camera. "A pneumatic system bridges the whole facility," Doug told him. "The power's dead." He struggled with the last word.

Not willing to resign totally to someone else's direction, the pilot gestured up. "Lead the way."

Doug nodded. He paused a moment to listen. The pilot heard it, too, and he knew it from his own entrance to the gallery: the sound of shifting debris. Someone was trying to get through the barricade. He tossed the cube up first, an odd but apparently effective weapon, and then pulled himself up. He offered the pilot a hand, but he refused, hoisting himself up on his own. Doug reached out of the circular vent at an odd angle and tapped at the same spot, maybe a keypad. When he was done he flipped the panel back into place and pulled his hand back as the vent closed.

Darkness surrounded them but for the light from the pilot's rifle. The duct was round like the opening, and the pilot could imagine them travelling all throughout the underground facility like some gigantic hamster habitat. The thought of being a lab rat didn't help the situation.

"Override codes," the scientist explained. "The suction is off, but the vents still work." The pilot ignored him.

"What was that?" he asked, trying to hide the fear from his voice. His agitation was obvious, though. The new confines didn't help. The ventilation system was smaller than it had looked, and the pilot found himself on his knees. The agitation crept into his voice. "What happened here?"

Doug whimpered again. "They want… she made… I can't…" He broke down into sobs.

The pilot groaned. "For the love of God, just tell me what I need to know!"

Doug jumped at the outburst and threw his arms around the cube. The pilot leveled his rifle, but lowered it when he realized the cube wouldn't do any good in such cramped quarters. The scientist breathed heavily and murmured something as he stared at one of the hearts on the cube. After a minute or so, just as the pilot was losing patience with the mad man, he turned and spoke.

"We don't know where they came from. All we know is what she wanted."

Suddenly the stale air in the vents was alive with a static hum. It was the same noise the pilot had heard in the elevator room and the upstairs offices, except rather than a burst of static it was softer and sustained. Doug started shivering. Then she spoke.

"Aperture Science Log mmddyyyy: Another breakthrough. Test Subjects exposed to ununpentium infused neurotoxin are more durable than control test subjects. They are also more susceptible to weapons infused with ununpentium. The weapons found with the original sample will be replicated. The Sentry Turrets scheduled for redemption have been called back from the Redemption Line for further testing. The ununpentium will be tested on other Aperture products for potential enhancements. Today, Thermal Discouragement Beams and Rocket Turrets are being tested for ununpentium effects. Tomorrow, the ununpentium will be incorporated into the Excursion Funnel, the Handheld Portal Device, and the Hard Light Bridge tests. Exceptionally dangerous results are predicted as results from future testing on the already unstable mobility gels. Still, Science requires that I ignore the risk."

The white noise buzzed in their ears for a few seconds after she stopped talking. Once that faded the two were left in silence. The pilot thought about what he'd heard. Some tests on a strange element, test subjects, and hadn't she mentioned _reanimation _earlier? There was a time when he would have laughed at the idea, but that was before Aperture, before Black Mesa. He wasn't sure what was possible anymore. Maybe the shivering man before him had a right to be insane. Maybe it was insane to be sane after what he'd been through. Regardless, he needed to be sure. He hesitated before speaking. "Are we dealing with…" he felt ridiculous saying it, "zombies here?"

"Dead are rising," he said to the cube. "Am I? But I can't be. No. No, she brought me back. Back from stasis. Not from death. I'm alive." He looked to the pilot. "I'm alive."

He gave the cube a shove and crawled after it on hands and knees. He looked back to the pilot expectantly.

"Follow me."

The pilot grunted. 'Dead are rising.' It wasn't the direct answer he was looking for. Hell, it wasn't even directed at him, but it was something. At least he was getting somewhere.

Crawling along after Doug, the pilot thought back to the… zombie that attacked him, and the painting; there were so many. He wondered how many more there could actually be. He nearly asked Rattman, but quickly decided against putting his guide into another panic attack. He wondered how many the man had faced, not even considering asking him. With all these unanswerable questions taunting him, he could feel his temper returning. The pilot knew he needed to learn something or he'd lose his cool.

"Where the hell are we going, anyway?"

Rattman paused. He turned to the pilot with a question of his own. "Why are you here?"

The pilot felt irritation wash over his thoughts. This guy was really bad at answering questions. "I asked my question first."

Doug didn't seem to care. "But what are you doing here?" he asked. "How did you even get here? The quarantine pro-"

"Just answer the damn question!" The pilot said, adding emphasis with his weapon.

"We have a few hideouts!" Doug said nervously. "Places where they can't reach, where it's safe to keep paint and food. Nonperishable. I haven't eaten in a while. I thought you might need some food, too."

The pilot lowered his weapon. Doug seemed to gain some courage from the gesture, enough at least to ask again.

"But why are you here?"

The pilot shrugged. He didn't see any harm in telling a person he was supposed to be helping. "Distress call. We were sent with orders to rescue any personnel and recover any useful tech."

"There are others?" Doug seemed hopeful, yet apprehensive.

The pilot pushed away the screams, the booming voice, the crash. "Only a few of us made it in. We were separated after that."

Doug seemed to ponder this information. He mumbled to himself, then fell silent as if expecting an answer. Finally he looked back at the pilot. "We have to find them. We'll stand a better chance as a group."

The pilot rolled his eyes. "Last time I saw them, one was at least three stories up and the other two were in a falling elevator. Even if they survived that _and_ the… there's still no way we could just find them. I mean, how big is this place?"

"It's built on an old salt mine. It goes on for miles, but it's all linked by elevators and Pneumatic Diversity Vents. I can navigate the whole facility. The vents are our best bet since they can't get in here with the power out."

The pilot didn't share Doug's optimism, but the man was thinking. He had a plan. That was better than wandering around in the dark.

"Alright then," the pilot said. "Where do we start?"

Doug went to speak, but stopped. He sat frozen for a moment before asking, "Do you hear that?"

The pilot listened and heard it too. It was a subtle hissing at first, but it grew gradually in volume. A gentle breeze passed over him, less gentle as the noise grew louder.

"Oh no. How?" Was all Doug could say before an artificial gale blew away his mumbling. His lab coat and hair whipped spastically around him.

"What's going on?" The pilot shouted over the wind. He felt his feet lose traction, fell forward, and suddenly the unnatural wind was carrying him. He could see Rattman in front of him, and, despite the wind, caught some of what Doug said.

"I don't know how it reactivated- don't know where it's taking us!"

The pilot was hurtling through the ventilation system. He had no idea where he was going and no idea if he would survive the journey. To him the only significant difference between this and the elevator was a change of vertical to horizontal. Then, his stomach churned as the vent curved downward.

**Hope you don't mind Rattman's unintelligible selfmusing. He's schizophrenic. The man can't help it. Oh yeah! If Rattman's character seems wrong, don't hold back. Advice will be appreciated.**


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